Peruvian-Japanese restaurant, Osaka

On Tuesday, we went to Osaka, a Peruvian-Japanese restaurant (Soler 5608 y Fitz Roy). I was very curious, and excited. This place came highly recommended, and was the type of place you had to get reservations days in advance. I read about it in Time Out:

After hitting it big in Lima, the chain established residence in BA in 2005, and the expert kitchen staff has been winning porteno admirers ever since, with a fusion menu featuring truly eclectic creations like duck confit-stuffed samosas and deep-fried Peruvian-style fish in Japanese mushroom sauce. Fresh salmon and shrimp are rolled into sushi or smoked and stuffed into cripsy spring rolls. Culinary adventurers shouldn't miss sampling a few of Osaka's unusual South America-meets-Far East starters...

The decor was lovely, and the menu long and tempting. We ordered three starters that were indeed a fusion of Peruvian and Japanese: ceviche using fish cut in Japanese style with a Peruvian sauce, a flaming causas of shell fish in a butter sauce, and a spoon of tuna on top of some sort of potato mound. All were delicious and new to me.

Thereafter though, I made some bad choices and unknowingly ended up with 2 deep-fried dishes that were not my style. One had cream cheese in it, and totally ruined the delicate shellfish aftertaste I was enjoying. I ordered a last dish of grilled fish with a Peruvian spice sauce, but was too full to have more than one bite.

If we lived here and needed a break from the mostly Italian or cafe menus, I'm sure I'd pine to eat here more often. However, I realized we are super spoiled coming from San Francisco where we are used to amazing food all the time, and somehow Osaka didn't wow me. The first 3 starters did, so I think it was my bad on menu choices. We skipped any kind of sushi because, well, we can eat that all the time at home.

So overall, it was worth it, but better menu choices would have helped as well as feeling like we hadn't had creative fish dishes in a long time.